UNDP and the Private Sector

Ghuncha Gul runs a greenhouse that produce cucumber, tomato and other off-season vegetables in village in Injil district of western Herat province of Afghanistan. She has employed eight other woman from her village, each of them earning around $80 a month.

Business plays a vital role as an engine of economic growth and job creation globally. It provides goods and services, generates tax revenues, creates jobs, and develops innovative solutions that help tackle development challenges. The private sector is an important strategic partner for UNDP in tackling poverty and creating long-term growth that benefits everyone. UNDP's Strategic Plan 2018-2021 prioritizes partnerships with business. The plan envisages UNDP broadening and deepening its responsible engagement with the private sector, working with governments to mobilize private capital for domestic investment in sustainable development.

UNDP works with companies from a range of sectors in most of the 170 countries and territories where we operate—from water, energy, and extractives to food and agriculture, consumer products, healthcare, finance, and information technology.

Launched in 2008, BCtA aims to accelerate progress toward sustainable development by challenging companies to develop inclusive business models that engage people at the base of the economic pyramid—meaning those with less than US$8 per day in purchasing power—as consumers, producers, suppliers, and distributors of goods and services.

CBi, launched in 2016, works to launch private sector networks engaged in disaster risk reduction, emergency preparedness, and crisis response and recovery. In its first year, CBi supported private sector-led networks in 13 locations: Côte d’Ivoire, Fiji, Haiti, Kenya/East Africa, Madagascar, Mexico, Myanmar, Nigeria, the Pacific, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, Turkey, and Vanuatu. Eight of those networks mobilized in response to emergencies in the last year, and CBi plans to expand to 40 countries by 2020.

The GIM initiative is a UNDP-led, multi-stakeholder research and advocacy effort that seeks to understand and enable more inclusive business models globally that will help create new opportunities and better lives for many of the world’s poor. Learn more about UNDP’s expanding work with the private sector.